Tranquility
So here I sit, broken hearted—no, wait. Hold on. Take two. So here I sit, Monday morn, snow on rabbitbrush, cold front born. According to my nifty digital weather center, it's 35 degrees. Things have changed. Suddenly. Autumn is having one of its little chill attacks. No problem. I'm OK with it, because I spent last week in Paradise.
As it turned out, Paradise was good ole Pyramid Lake. It's always nifty when Paradise is conveniently local, and last week, Pyramid was a place of exquisite light and blessed windlessness. It was there for the taking. I'm smugly happy to report that I got off my rear end last week and helped myself.
It became glaringly obvious that Pyramid was indeed Paradise on Sunday the 20th, when I went out to the Willows on the northwest end of the lake to do a bit of birding. We didn't see much in the way of birds, but the lake itself quickly impressed. There was simply no nicer place to be on planet Earth that afternoon—73, sunny, clear, winds of zero to zero point five. The light was rich and the water dark blue. And flat. Flat glass. You don't see Pyramid like this in April or May. It just, quite simply, felt real good to be there, to be a live functional entity glomming it all up. The band XTC has a great song that fit this scene—“Senses Working Overtime.”
Upon getting back home that night, I looked up the weather for the week, and lo and behold, Monday through Friday were gonna be just as nice as Sunday. Warm. Calm. Perf. A voice sounded in my mind. “Hey. You have a trailer. You wanna use it? Or what?” Yes, I replied. If not now, when?
I parked the trailer on a bluff north of Spider Point that overlooks the lake. From this spot, I could see the Willows and the Needles to the north, the Pyramid to the south. For three days, each as perfect, weather-wise, as the day before, I could watch the lake in its glassy glory, usually perfectly flat, with just an occasional breeze ripple on its surface to give it a touch of sheen. When the lake is this calm, it becomes possible to see every tiny wake made by every grebe and gull as they leisurely paddle about. I could see dozens of these telltale wakes. Mondo fab. It was extremely easy to just sit, enjoy and savor. What a truly fine place to sit. This was sitting and watching and snacking and sipping taken to a high level.
The waning moon came up over the eastern mountains, sending a ghostly beam of lunar light on the water. Out here, I could sleep the sleep of the unfettered simpleton. In the morning, my perch would be re-assumed, coffee in hand, hand under blanket, waiting for the sun to rise upon this Lake of Tranquility.